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Jira isn't just for software teams anymore. Let's discuss how PMOs are using it to manage portfolios

Manuel Rahman
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September 3, 2026

I lead an international PMO and we've been on a journey to adapt Jira for business project delivery rather than software development. We're using it for portfolio management, workload planning, governance, reporting, RAID management, executive visibility, and project tracking across multiple regions.

I'm interested in connecting with others who are using Jira as a more traditional project management platform. How have you approached requirements such as Gantt charts, RAID logs, resource management, status reporting, and stakeholder governance? What has worked well, and what challenges have you encountered?

Let's share experiences, lessons learned, and best practices for taking Jira beyond software teams.

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Matthew Sinclair
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September 3, 2026

Been employing JSM for Intake/Approvals before handing off to Jira - I would also point at Atlassian "Projects" - a platform tool that allows you to quickly push updates at a high level for anyone/stakeholders without digging into the details - while Leveraging Rovo to summarize.

https://www.atlassian.com/platform/platform-apps/projects

If your Org has Teamwork Collection - you very likely already have this free app.

 

As for challenges - as an Org Admin/Engineer/Architect - understanding terms and what PMO's are looking for. XD

 

Best practices- keep it simple - you don't need a custom status/field for every-single-thing.

Customization bloat is a big problem - think long term - scalability.

More than ever with the changes Atlassian are making to their billing models.

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Steven Haworth
Contributor
September 3, 2026

We are using Confluence and Jira extensively for project management.  Our main tool is Tempo Structure, with a Business Jira space defined.  Jira tickets in that space are incorporated into Structure, with dates, assignees, priority, etc.  Structure then builds a Gantt from that, which can be baselined and tracked.

Tickets (ie tasks) have status, and are reviewed as normal task mgmt (overdue, due in 2 weeks, no due date assigned yet, etc).  And Structure (or just link relationships) let you define dependent linkages between tasks, or to milestones, or whatever. We love it!

Risk is managed with a dedicated Software Jira space - each risk is a ticket, with it's own categories, escalation status, owner, etc.  We don't pull those into the Structure, but if a Task is related to a Risk we do link the Jira tickets.

 

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Sean Perry
Contributor
September 4, 2026

Hi @Manuel Rahman 
Firstly, I'd say this post doesn't really belong in this group, probably better in Teamwork Lab: Improving our ways of working?

To respond to your question - we use Projects, Confluence and Jira together to manage our Portfolio. Confluence is used as the intake and where we capture Scope. Projects is the company facing tracker where all Projects are updated so progress is visible to everyone, and Jira is where the different Work Packages are tracked, and tickets are raised for Issues, etc.

We use Rovo agents we created during the project lifecycle to generate weekly project updates for clients, at the end of the project to turn the original intake page into a service description for internal Account Managers. We have saved Jira queries for Open Issues, Open Client Questions. Every Friday we have  a weekly Project Review using Atlas as the source of truth.

Still a work in progress, but way better than where were a year ago,

AMIN EL
September 6, 2026

I think this is a great topic worth its dedicated time and group. Could we possibly add all the community and Atlassian resources/links that guides us towards Business oriented System of Work primarily using the Team Collection (Blue Zone)

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